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The 1850 Affair of the Brownsville Separatists

Are you the owners of real estate in the valley of the Rio Grande?Texas would force you into expensive and ruinous lawsuits. If youdesire the prosperity of this valley - a rapid development of itsagricultural resources, and the quiet enjoyment of your property,which you have acquired by years of industrious toil, you mustlook to the United States for a disinterested government and in-dependent judiciary. With a territorial government, land titleswould at once be quieted, and the country settled and improvedby a producing population. Lands with undoubted titles might thenbe purchased for a less price than it would cost to locate them.A territorial organization is now within our reach. We have onlyto make our wishes known to Congress, and it will concede allthat we ask. Many of the States have instructed their Senators andrequested their Representatives to vote on all questions which mayarise, as though this was a territory distinct from Texas. A bill de-claring it such has already been introduced into the Senate.Fellow-citizens, not a moment is to be lost. This important ques-tion is now before Congress. Let there be a full and general at-tendance at this meeting of the people of Cameron County. Comeone, come all!!12As the lamps sputtered on into the night, pens sketched outplans for revolution. Men eager to control vast and verdantSpanish grants and porciones were elated with the night's work.For, with a territorial government established over the Nueces-Rio Grande country, their plans would proceed, they thought,unimpeded by the Texas government. With control of the terri-torial courts, their claims to Valley lands would, they hoped, bevalidated. The Separatists, therefore, passed the following reso-lutions:PREAMBLE AND RESOLUTIONS ADOPTED BY THE MEETINGWhereas, We believe that all that portion of country lying Eastof the Rio Grande and South of the line of New Mexico, distinctfrom the former province of Texas, of right belongs to the Govern-ment of the United States, and that the State of Texas has extendedher jurisdiction over it without our consent; and that the latemeasures taken by her will retard her growth and prosperity, byinvolving the property holders in endless and ruinous litigation,and thereby prevent the development of its resources, and,Whereas, We are, in geographical position as well as in interest,separate and distinct from Texas, and believe that a territorial2Texas State Gazette (Austin), March 23, 1850, reprinted from the AmericanFlag (Brownsville), February 6, 1850.